Facebook's 'Sponsored Stories' Turns Your News Feed Activity Into Ads

Facebook is rolling out a new advertising format called Sponsored Stories, which allows advertisers to prioritize content from the News Feed by turning your Facebook activity into promoted content.

Here's how it works: If one of your Page updates, Likes, app interactions or Place check-ins mention a participating brand, that story will appear in the column that appears at the right of your friends' News Feeds. "For example," writes Advertising Age, "if Starbucks buys a 'sponsored story' ad, the status of a user's friends who check into or 'like' Starbucks will run twice: once in the user's news feed, and again as a paid ad for Starbucks."

Sponsored Stories are seen only by your friends that would normally see your stories in their News Feeds. However, according to the product's help page , there is no op-out option for Sponsored Stories.

Coke, Levi's, (RED), Donors Choose, and Anheuser Busch are among Facebook's launch partners, Mashable reports, adding "anybody will be able to bid on Sponsored Story slots (by a per-impression and/or a per-click basis) starting January 25." [NOTE: A previous version of this story incorrectly identified (RED) as a non-profit. It is a for profit company.]

Already, similarities are being drawn between Sponsored Stories and Twitter's Promoted Tweets, which presented advertisements in the form of content for the site. But Facebook's approach goes a step further by turning the activities of its users into revenue for the site.

Facebook hopes that these Sponsored Stories (aka "word-of-mouth recommendations") will engage users more than the site's targeted ads. "Seeing that a friend has checked in at Starbucks is a much more compelling reason to visit than a standard advertisement telling a user to go get a coffee," Inside Facebook writes.

Watch the video (below) to see how a Sponsored Story will appear on your News Feed, then tell us how you feel about Facebook turning your activities into "recommendations" for your friends.

WATCH:

Comments

[EdBallsUp]

10:01 AM on 01/29/2011

Another way to exploit users. Nothing like this happens over at http://folkdirect.com - I'm pretty pleased I'm out of the Facebook loop now.

[themoosespeaks]

11:27 AM on 01/27/2011

Advertisers who take advantage of this will get a simple status update from me:

Boycott

Let them advertise that.

[themoosespeaks]

11:32 AM on 01/27/2011

Meant to say, Botcott "product name".

[EdBallsUp]

10:00 AM on 01/29/2011

Along with my friend group, I defected to http://folkdirect.com

[CraigMMoore]

07:43 AM on 01/27/2011

Sounds interesting, sponsored stories, I wonder if it's true though..
Craig @ http://www.weatherillbrothers.co.uk

[deepbluegoodbye]

04:54 PM on 01/26/2011

I wonder how fast Facebook would ditch this policy if everyone started posting status updates talking about how awful the sponsors' products are (especially if the comments are full of profanity). LOL

[Benjamin Rosenfeld]

04:24 PM on 01/26/2011

Why have nearly 800 people liked this article? Are they proponents of these ads?

[paintitblack]

12:13 PM on 01/27/2011

People are incredibly dumb and have no concept of what they're doing, just clicking and "liking" everything in sight.

[CarolColorado]

12:38 PM on 01/26/2011

The example used for the article is so emblematic of (1) modern literacy and (2) drivel that passes for intimacy on Facebook.

Acquarium....no
Aquarium....yes

The comment "wow!"........truly conveys the whole aquatic experience, doesn't it?

[Jeremy Mcwatters]

09:38 AM on 01/26/2011

Let me get this right, I help with the advertising campaigns .....Facebook makes ALL the money.

[StephenJK]

06:59 AM on 01/26/2011

Facebook's face is getting uglier by the day. Anyone else having the urge to punch your laptop right now? Stupid facebook.

[no repub ever]

03:48 AM on 01/26/2011

Hey cool kids FB is making money off of you. Isn't that just great. They are cashing in on your need for attention.

[FlibberFlabber]

03:10 AM on 01/26/2011

Man, can't Facebook gives us at least a week or six free from some inane/annoying change to the Facebook experience. It's like finding all your furniture rearranged every night when you come home from work. Give it a rest you dorks.

[rriverstone]

07:43 PM on 01/25/2011

SOYLENT GREEN IS PEOPLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[rriverstone]

07:40 PM on 01/25/2011

I can't wait for Facebook to try selling my friends Queer, agnostic, astrophysical, liberal politics in a remodeled house trailer on seven hundred dollars a month. This will be interesting.

[John E Priegnitz]

05:57 PM on 01/25/2011

Wow, my privacy has become a commodity... Thanks Facebook!

[MrJM]

04:01 PM on 01/25/2011

All Your Face Are Belong To Us!

-- MrJM

[StephenJK]

06:53 AM on 01/26/2011

Win

[PenguinLinux]

03:50 PM on 01/25/2011

....and in other news boys and girls, besides raping your privacy (and your soul), Mark Suckerberg has churned the fodder formerly known as "users" into chum to feed the machine. No longer is merely selling your data good enough for FB and Suckerberg, now you must become more part of the machine itself and become your own brand, a source of advertising for which there is no enumeration for you, but wanna bet there's a ton more money for Suckerberg and Co?

*sings "counting bodies like sheep to the rhythm of the war drum" *